a bleeding purple utah jazz blog

Preseason Game 5 Jazz vs. Clippers

Have to say, I haven’t felt generally this comfortable watching a Jazzman shoot 3s since Kyle Korver and Memo Okur were both on the roster…

Quotage from Practice on 10/19**Al Jefferson: I knew the trade coming with Mo and Randy Foye and them guys. Watching them last year, they like to run, and I knew Mo running the point. He got a chip on his shoulder; he want to prove that he can be a NBA point guard and not just a scorer. And I know that he gon be what he told me; he wanna run. I worked out with him, so I knew then that I had to be able to keep up with him. So I just wanna improve every year. But it’s gonna be the new beginning for the rest of my career. I normally let my weight go up and down and stuff like that, but I made a promise to myself this year I’m gonna keep it down, and not only for just this year; for my whole career.

**Jeremy Evans on which was better, the Gerald Wallace dunk or the Ronny Turiaf dunk: If the Gerald Wallace dunk wasn’t called offensive foul, I’d say that one better.

**Evans on whether he’s a small forward or power forward: Right now, still trying to find myself. Probably a little more small forward. Guys at the power forward position are pretty big guys and they’re a lot stronger than I am, so probably small forward.

**Tyrone Corbin, on whether Evans is a small forward or power forward: He’s a player…He’s more comfortable at the four because that’s who he’s always been, but [my] message to him is, “Look, when you’re on the floor, just play. Don’t worry about the position. Just play basketball, and you’ll be just fine.” … The things we talked about him improving on, he has shown improvement in the things we talked about him getting better at.

**Corbin on the team’s 3-point shooting: It’s one of the areas we talked about having to get better at in the offseason. We’ve shown some improvement in it in the exhibition here, and we want to take advantage of the opportunities when they present themselves.

**Corbin on where the team is five games in: We had a lot of growth. We’re getting better.

**Corbin on the Jazz’s pick and roll defense and defensive goals: We’re working on it. We’re looking to get better. Not only on the pick and roll defense, our overall defense have to get better. Giving up 99 points is not where we want to be…Close to 82, 83 points a game, would be ideal for us. But also field goal percentage, we want to keep teams under 42 percent. (KALL)

Quotage, Post-Game**Alec Burks on his dunk (above): I’m trying to get in the dunk contest. That’s all it was…I want to take the trophy.

Unintentional Dirty Quote Machines of the Night (UDQM)

** Corbin: Younger teams tend to be able to do it for longer stretches, middle-aged teams can do it going back and forth, and older teams don’t do it. (Trib)** Paul Millsap: We’ve got a lot of guys to come in if somebody needs a blow. We’ve got a lot of guys to come in and fill that position. (Trib)

From the Clippers’ announcers:** Millsap has that hitch in his shot where he kind of cocks it behind.** Holding, shooting, arching, missing.** Millsap dances to the hole and puts it in.** Burks in deep to Quinn.** Chris Paul was terrific, went a hard 36 minutes here.

Maybe it was the concept of the starters hyping up the second string, but Hayward’s Alley-oop was just as impressive if not more so because of what he had to do to get it done, but his bench reaction wasn’t as good as Burks.